LGBTAitp - Part Fifteen

[unosarta]

Not really, cutting your nose to spite your face means doing something that harms yourself greatly in order to harm, or attempt to harm, someone else.

Link for more info: http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/106875.html


I'm not sure of any similar expressions, but the reverse of the expression is almost that "one bad apple spoils the whole bunch". Though that can be more of a cautionary expression of removing the bad apple(s) before it can spoil the whole bunch.

Interesting.

Thanks for clarifying, and providing the link.

[Coidzor]

That logic doesn't follow. I'll take the most basic, obvious route: maybe her parents didn't raise her that way.

Sure it does. Given the premise of individuals who are, despite lengthy explanations and a lifetime of education by interacting with gendered individuals, incapable of comprehending gender, the simplest explanation is that they have, as part of their being on some level or another, an inability to understand gender.

And so, if gender were something that was fundamentally nothing more than a learned behavior, these individuals who are capable of learning and otherwise of the normal range of mentality and intelligence would be capable of grasping it even if they did not subscribe to it.

Thusly, comprehending gender must be more complicated than mere active education and either be a result of a lot of passive influences (in which case, in the unthinking, apathetic way of humans, it seems quite unlikely that a pair of parents would be able to excise those passive cues from their child's development) or some part of the human mind that picks up on those sorts of influences & cues and interprets them for the conscious self.

[0Megabyte]

I honestly don't care for any of this debate, but I hate when people misuse metaphors, so I am going to have to stop you there.

First of all; Gender is not a living thing, and the implied preciousness of life that goes along with that metaphor does not apply to it (because it is being implied in the metaphor). I really dislike metaphors like that in general, but this one is especially bad.

Second of all; you appear to be implying that the concept of Gender as you understand it, only affects those who "possess" it, or I guess you could say "use" it, and by "returning" it to those who do not have a problem with it, the returner is releasing themselves of all of the effects of Gender. The whole point of Gender, as far as I can tell from both sides here, is that it is used, as a social construct, to judge a person, and extrapolate facts or ideas about that person from it. Therefore, those who "possess" or "use" Gender are in fact using it against everyone else. That is the point of Gender as a social construct. You are implying, from what I can tell, something that is very very different in your metaphor.

I'm not going to get involved in the debate at all, but I am going to step in here and correct the use of the expression.

The "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" expression has nothing to do with the implied preciousness of life. For this expression, the baby is deemed to be an item you don't want to lose and the water is deemed to be an item you do want to get rid of. The bathwater is part of group "inside bathtub" and so is the baby. You want to get rid of the bathwater so you remove everything in the group "inside bathtub", at the same time removing something you didn't want to lose. The baby may be precious because it is a living being, but that is completely immaterial to the expression.


Source: http://www.wisegeek.com/what-does-th...water-mean.htm

Though, the expression of course still applies even when it is known that not everything in the group is bad, but you're doing it anyway.

I have always heard the expression used with the implied preciousness of life. However, thank you for clearing that up, as that does make some sense. I assumed that the preciousness of life was what made the baby the object that one would not want to lose. Do you know of any close expressions with similar meanings? I have heard the expression before, but I never really liked it. Would "cutting the nose to spite the face" be close enough to be considered usable without being too different? (for I could definitely see the differences in the expressions)

Well... that aspect of this conversation looks pretty well settled without me. Thank you for popping in, Rawhide, you probably got this part done much better than I could.

But yes, this was the way I meant (and tortured) the metaphor: Gender as a concept has a lot of value. To abandon the entire thing, because there are some problems, seems to me as a drastic step, as you said you wished, seems unnecessary. It's better to fix problems, in ways such as changing society so that it accepts people who don't fit its preconceptions, change those preconceptions so that it takes the fact that not everyone fits into account, and various other things. There's a large conversation to be had about improvements that could be made, and accommodation for those who fit the mold, but it's definitely better to metaphorically give those with wheelchairs an on ramp, but not at the same time eliminate stairs. Stairs work just fine for most people, and should be kept, as they work. On-ramps for those who can't use them, however, should also exist, because it's only right to accommodate those who do not fit. Makes sense?

Third of all (because I like evenness in my posts); I think I need a clarification here, so I am going to ask you a question that I hope will clear up some confusion I am having.

@0Megabyte; do you consider happiness a fundamental right of a human being? Another question; do you consider a majority to have the ability to take the rights away from a minority?

I believe, first of all, that rights and realities are different things. I know my dad being alive again would be necessary to make me truly happy. Needless to say, the universe has not bothered to call me back on that one.

If there is a right to happiness, it only exists because we decide it exists. It, in and of itself, is a social construct just like gender is, a convenient short-hand that we as a society use to express some of its values and goals.

However, I believe that the ability to pursue happiness is a fundamental right. I cannot make you happy. Nothing I can do will ever do that, in and of itself, for any action I take could be interpreted by you as bad, or good, at your leisure.

What I can do, however, is stay out of your way, help when help is asked for and needed, and do whatever I can to reverse social and economic injustices that make it disproportionately difficult for you to achieve the happiness you desire.

The fact that, if you are born in a poor household, you are less likely to succeed than if you were born in a middle-class or upper-class household is something that limits that right, for example. Things like that need to be corrected however best we can do it.

But no, you don't have a right to be happy. Only you can make yourself happy. Only you can decide what will make it.

Of course, if you decided that killing the Miami Dolphins is necessary for you to be happy... well, then we have a problem.

A problem that exists because compromises in one's own rights must be made, if we are to live in a working society with all the benefits it gives. If we did not give up the "right" to drive however fast we want in our cars, then the damage it would wreak would definitely outweigh the benefits of having such laws. For such basic things as transporting goods, transporting people, and being able to play in your neighborhood without being run over depend on such curtailments of rights.

Now, to answer the second part of your question: Democracy means that yes, the majority do get to decide what we do. That's kind of what it means. But justice depends on the majority being constrained from unfairly targeting the minority.

If you're in the minority of people who think drinking and driving is A-OK, then yes, we absolutely have the right to take that right away. If you aren't doing something that impedes other people, like drinking at home? No, we absolutely do NOT get the right to forbid you, just because we the majority disagree with you.

In the case of not getting gender, and not fitting in with society... well, as I said before with the on-ramps metaphor, we should definitely try to accommodate you. But we are not going to get rid of stairs, either, no matter how much you wish we would.

Also: Life is pain, and anyone who tells you any different is selling you something. Though we all suffer in different ways, we still all suffer. It's easy to think one's own problems are more important than they are, or to twist one's own problems so that they apply to things that are innocent.

In the atheist community, I saw a complaint recently about a bible sitting in a dentist's waiting room, among a bunch of magazines. The point is not whether any belief is right or wrong, but complaining about even seeing the thing you disagree with, as these few atheists did here, overreaches.

And so does wishing to get rid of gender, just because you don't like it.

Because, when the minority don't have a right to take things away from the majority in just the same way. And we certainly aren't using gender against you. Some people might, but they're the same sorts of people who use cars against others, and we don't want to get rid of cars, do we?

One last thing: We don't use gender against other people when we use it. You might as well say we use our eyes against someone when we see them, or use our ears against someone when we hear their voices and judge whether they can sing or not. It just doesn't make any sense. If you are offended by the fact that we use it at all... well, nobody has a right to not be offended.

Or else my entire existence would deserve to be snuffed out. Because I darn well offend.

[WarKitty]

Stereotypes hurt people; stereotypes about things you cannot control doubly so. Even if you mean no harm, you are hurting me simply by insisting that I have to be a man or woman. Because it simply isn't true. You're forcing me to be judged by something that I had no control over, that does not fit or describe me, and that hampers my ability to interact with people in a genuine manner.

The problem with the examples given is that none of us are saying that you can't have a gender identity. And it is being used against me, even by the people who are insisting it's not. The problem is - I don't want it forced on me. And what people are arguing for is not their right to their own identity, it's their right to see me by my physical shape instead of the person I actually am. Because every time you try to push me into a gender box, that is what you're doing - denying who I am in favor of some random checkbox that's on my birth certificate.

Yes, it hurts. It hurts because I feel that no matter where I go, I will never be outside of this. Because I can't be me without people telling me that my identity doesn't exist, that I'm just deluding myself. And frankly anyone who says "only you can make you happy" is deluding themselves. We are social creatures. We need to be loved and accepted and cared for to be happy. Most of us cannot live in a society where every single person around us refuses to see us for who we are and still be happy.

Also? Totally in favor of eliminating stairs. Why build two different features when the people who use stairs can also use ramps? It just reinforces the idea that there's something "different" about the people that can't, that they don't belong with the rest of us.

Edit: Ok, I'm kind of angry right now. I'm not going to take this down, but I am going to put a "It's 3am and I've been pretty stressed lately" disclaimer on it.

And on a personal note: What I grew up with was the gender version of separate but equal. And it worked about as well as the racial version did. I get angry because I think a lot of these other messages are re-inforcing that same idea. I don't think you can separate people based on such things without it becoming a situation where one is "better" than the other. I think any attempt at maintaining the ideas behind gender in their current binary form will inevitably lead to having one seen as superior to the other.

[Coidzor]

The problem with the examples given is that none of us are saying that you can't have a gender identity.

...Wait, so what were we talking about earlier then?

I was given to understand that the issue was the incomprehensibility of individuals having a sense of gender.

Have I been coming in at this sideways the entire time?

Also? Totally in favor of eliminating stairs. Why build two different features when the people who use stairs can also use ramps? It just reinforces the idea that there's something "different" about the people that can't, that they don't belong with the rest of us.

Stairs certainly have their architectural purposes that ramps cannot hope to fulfill & remain both scalable & allow for more than two stories to buildings smaller than a barn though.

[Serpentine]

Sure it does. Given the premise of individuals who are, despite lengthy explanations and a lifetime of education by interacting with gendered individuals, incapable of comprehending gender, the simplest explanation is that they have, as part of their being on some level or another, an inability to understand gender.

And so, if gender were something that was fundamentally nothing more than a learned behavior, these individuals who are capable of learning and otherwise of the normal range of mentality and intelligence would be capable of grasping it even if they did not subscribe to it.

Thusly, comprehending gender must be more complicated than mere active education and either be a result of a lot of passive influences (in which case, in the unthinking, apathetic way of humans, it seems quite unlikely that a pair of parents would be able to excise those passive cues from their child's development) or some part of the human mind that picks up on those sorts of influences & cues and interprets them for the conscious self.

No, not in the least. "If it is learned, you must necessarily have learned it" is nonsensical. I could have learned all sort of things - to write right-handed, for instance, or to fly an aeroplane. The fact that I haven't certainly doesn't mean it's not learned. Conversely, if it were an innate natural feature common to all people, Lissou would have also possessed it - thanks to biology, that claim isn't actually true, but it's no less untrue than the claim that "if it were learned, you would have learned it".

Now, I don't believe "gender" (conflated type, here) is entirely socially-constructed. Evolutionary biology and sociology and such have demonstrated quite well that there are certain differences between the sexes in terms of trends and tendencies. For example, all things being equal, more girls will preferentially play with dolls than boys will, and there is a pretty well-supported evolutionary reason for that.
However. I believe these objective observations are grossly exaggerated and reinforced by society: "more girls prefer dolls than boys" becomes "girls play with dolls" and "boys do not play with dolls". As a result, more girls play with dolls more often than they might otherwise, and boys who, all things being equal, would also quite like to play with them are made to feel "wrong" or "girly" or whatever if they do. People are being forced to do and be what they don't want to do and be, because society has arbitrarily decided this is so. When it's called on it, it points back to stuff like "but girls do prefer dolls! Science says so!"
And of course, it's not just dolls. "Women tend to be more "nurturing"/seek nurturing roles" becomes "a woman who doesn't want kids isn't a real woman" (at least one Forumer has come across this one) and "men who like spending time with kids are probably perverts"; "many men tend not to express their emotions as well or as openly as women" becomes "men have no feelings" and "men who express their feelings are sissies" and "a woman who has trouble expressing her feelings is a cold-hearted bitch"; and so on. Observations become expectations become requirements become the basis for ostracisation and punishment for natural inclinations. Observations are natural. Expectations are expected, and may be the aforementioned "mental short-cuts", so long as one's expectations are quick to change when faced with deviations. It's when it's taken further than that - and it is - that "gender" is a bad thing.
That is my problem with gender: it takes reasonable observations of biological differences in terms of trends and tendencies between males and females, blows them way out of proportion and then feeds them back to us as requirements in order to be considered "real" males or females. And that is not a "shortcut", it's lazy, oppressive, nonsensical, obsolete and has absolutely no place in the modern world.

Now, to answer the second part of your question: Democracy means that yes, the majority do get to decide what we do. That's kind of what it means. But justice depends on the majority being constrained from unfairly targeting the minority.

See also: Tyranny of the Majority.

edit: "I cannot comprehend" != "you should not have".

[WarKitty]

...Wait, so what were we talking about earlier then?

I was given to understand that the issue was the incomprehensibility of individuals having a sense of gender.

Have I been coming in at this sideways the entire time?

Given that we're a few pages of point-counterpoint-countercounterpoint-countercountercounterpoint in, I'm not sure any of us know what we're talking about anymore. And I am not going to try to figure it out at 4 in the morning.

Stairs certainly have their architectural purposes that ramps cannot hope to fulfill & remain both scalable & allow for more than two stories to buildings smaller than a barn though.

In all seriousness though, one of my side interests is studying accessibility architecture. One of the big things a lot of disabled people will tell you is to try to make as many of the main points of the building accessible, rather than having separate accessible bits. E.g. the main door and the normal restroom should be accessible, rather than having a separate "handicapped" door and bathroom and so forth. Otherwise it tends to reinforce the idea that the disabled are different and separate, when it's not necessary.

[Lissou]

If I cannot tell if a person is a male or female, that weirds me out, not because there's anything wrong with the person, but because the shorthand (which I mentioned in my previous post here) doesn't work, and I have no clue how to approach or act towards that person at a subconscious level.

But how can you tell? Since gender doesn't even match sex, unless they tell you so, you can very well assume the wrong gender identity even if they do have one. Because the only thing you can base yourself off is physical, and therefore more about sex than gender.
So, you see someone, deduce their sex from their appearance, deduce their gender from their sex, deduce the way you expect them to act, feel and think from their gender. But honestly with all these assumption, is your shortcut really going to be more effective than just waiting to get to know the person? Especially when your assumptions can get in the way of learning about someone, because you'll assume different reasons for their actions, or you won't ask, etc.

Even if some people put too much stock in stereotypes, that will always happen, it would happen no differently in a world where, weirdly enough, people are born physically male and female but are for some reason treated as though they're exactly the same.

I'm fine with them being treating differently purely as far as body goes. And I don't mean assuming all women are weaker than all males or anything like that, but say you need a tampon, makes more sense to ask a woman than a man if she's got any on hand, for instance. That I can get, despite the fact that not all women have periods, no males do as far as I know (maybe some intersex people do?)

However, even so, there is a huge difference between men and women, one based not on gender but on sex: Women are the ones who physically have babies.

But that doesn't have to do with gender. People identify as males while having the ability to be pregnant. People identify as female (cis or trans) without having that ability. Your point is "gender is based on the fact that females can be pregnant" but that's what sex is. Sex says females can be pregnant and not males. Gender isn't tied to sex and therefore it doesn't have that same distinction.

This being said, I don't think it's worth revolving our whole society around. It annoys me how things are so often about the children. Some people say gays can't marry because marriage is about kids (even though nobody forces married people to have kids), people tell me I shouldn't have more than one committed relationship because it's bad for kids (even though it hasn't been proven so) and now you say gender exists because it's better for raising kids...
It's driving me crazy. I don't even want kids and I get constantly limited it what I can't do because other people will have them? If it's all about the kids, can I sign a contract, get sterilised and never have to follow all these rules anymore?

And while I get that there is the pregnancy thing, you also have adoption, people carrying babies for others, things like that. On top of that, it's 9 months per kid. Sure it's kind of a while, but nowadays it's what, 1% of someone's life? Less than that if they live over 75. So if a person has one kid, they're defined by 1% of their life and have to follow societal rules based on just that. And even less than 1%, really, because it's not like the pregnancy is everything they do during that time. They still lead their lives. They still do the rest.
Even assuming an average of two kids, that's 2%. We've reached a point in which women can't even have kids for a majority of their lives, when you add up the time they're too young to and the time they're too old to.

The raising? Can be done by both. The earning the money? Both. The everything other than carrying the child and giving birth? Anyone. Don't need a womb and vagina for that.

Yet genders are not based on attitudes for females with such physical parts to have during pregnancy. They're about them from birth to death. And even the things that could help with raising a kid, like playing with dolls, give no benefits during pregnancy, only after birth.
And after birth, a kid may be taken care of by anyone, because they're not physically tied to a person anymore.

Now, I can see how it would be better for a kid to stay with the birth mom, and be breastfed by them, and things like that, for the connection. But none of that has to happen, and very often it doesn't. Other people breastfeed the kid or they're given formula, for instance.

You view this as bad, or at least alien and unnecessary because it causes you problems.

I don't think it causes me the most problems. It's an annoyance but I'm not the one having to live with everything trans people have to deal with.

In part, gender is a reaction to the main very real difference between men and women. Part of it is arbitrary, and no cultural shorthand, no stereotype, no established role, will ever fit everyone 100%.

The problem here is I'm not sure it even fits anyone 100%. If gender is about a list of A-things and a list of B-things, and we decide to take half the A-things and half the B-things and switch them, won't we end up with about the same amount of people being represented accurately? Then why pick A vs B rather than AB vs BA or something completely different?
It would be much easier if one could easily tell, when faced with something new, which category it's supposed to fit in. But it seems very random to me. I can't base it on myself, I can't base it on other people I know. It's like I need to carry and encyclopedia at all times to check for everything if it was decided to be F or M.

Females more nurturing than males? I've never experienced that. People are caring or they're cold. And sometimes they don't act the same to everyone. But men who took care of me, protected me, loved me, there have been lots.
But hey, since they're male, it's now their protective instinct of males that played a part there. But see, females also are shown as being protective. So what the heck? Which is it? Obviously it's not based on gender, it's based on personality.

"Women shouldn't be pressured to sacrifice a career for children if they don't want to!" is something a feminist would say. They're all speaking of gender as though it's real, as though their own interpretation of what it means and should mean is real.

What does that have to do with gender? Haven't we established that carrying a child is something dependent on sex, not gender? What does that sentence have to do with gender, exactly?

Humans need to be able to peg things quickly, or have some kind of societal cue of "in front of this kind of person, act like this, don't act like that" to get through the day and do all those things we need to do, like work at our job, or court a potential partner.

I don't want people to act towards me a specific way because of assumption they make about me. I want people to act a specific way because of me. If they buy me a gift, it should be because they've heard me mentioning I like it, not because they assume all women like it. Shortcuts are one thing when they're for dealing with someone you've just met, but they should be temporary and immediately replaced with actual facts and knowledge of the person as it comes up.
Instead, the assumptions and shortcuts are being enforced as a rule, and people are made to adapt to them rather than the assumptions being the one that change. That's my problem.

I'm fine(ish) with you assuming I like fashion when talking to me online and not seeing me. I'm not fine with this assumption staying after you meet me and see the way I dress. I'm fine(ish) with the assumption I don't like some activities. I'm not fine with not being invited to them as a result. If I really don't want to go, I can just say no, and if I want to go I'd like a chance to say yes.

Without those, it would be like... you know how some foreigners do strange things, you have no idea why, and it can impede understanding? Well, it would be like that for everyone, about everyone else.

I think you're trying to say that without that, we'd have to learn about other people, how they work, what they like and how to deal with them. Well you see, you still need to. If you use gender as a crutch not to have to do that, that's exactly where the problem lies. Yes, it's a pain having to get to know every new person and what they like, it's a pain not being able to just treat people according to a manual and list of things to do. But that's what comes with being individuals. You want to treat people according to who they are, and the template might be used to initiate contact, but it should be thrown out of the window as soon as possible.

Actually, no it wouldn't, because people would just go right back to differentiating their culture. "We do this, not that, unlike this other group. That is why we are who we are." Stuff like that. The point is, human societies need culture, and gender is a useful part of that.

People can associate based on things. Look, here we're on a DnD based comic's forums, in the LGBTA thread. We're obviously associating with these. But it's not something that others arbitrarily thrust upon us. It's something we decided. And something that only defines us as much or as little as we want it to. People who meet you for the first time don't start by deciding at first glance if you play DnD or not and then basing their assumptions about everything (including things completely unrelated) on the category they've picked.

About people not fitting, I feel it's like any stereotypes. I think they are harmful to dealing with others as human beings. Remember, I have a dream that people could be just not by the colour of their skin but the content of their character? Same kind of thing. Gender isn't the actual content of one's character. It's a projection of a template character that is pushed on someone with only a binary choice, when character isn't a binary thing.

Sure it does. Given the premise of individuals who are, despite lengthy explanations and a lifetime of education by interacting with gendered individuals, incapable of comprehending gender, the simplest explanation is that they have, as part of their being on some level or another, an inability to understand gender.

And so, if gender were something that was fundamentally nothing more than a learned behavior, these individuals who are capable of learning and otherwise of the normal range of mentality and intelligence would be capable of grasping it even if they did not subscribe to it.

What? There are lots of things that are taught and that not everyone can learn. Not to mention if someone thinks it's not true, it will prevent them from learning it. I don't know the stereotypes against, say, Jews, because I think that whole thing is BS. It doesn't mean I'm unable to learn them, I just reject the idea.

[Asta Kask]

Bad news from Sweden. The Stockholm pride has seen an unprecedented numbers of threats to volunteers. Including one assault case (although that may be unrelated - the volunteer wasn't wearing LGBT buttons, pins, etc.)

[Coidzor]

What? There are lots of things that are taught and that not everyone can learn. Not to mention if someone thinks it's not true, it will prevent them from learning it. I don't know the stereotypes against, say, Jews, because I think that whole thing is BS. It doesn't mean I'm unable to learn them, I just reject the idea.

You have that fine of a control over your memory? Or do you have to consciously choose to retain anything you're exposed to? Because the way you seem to be discussing processing information is unlike any that I've encountered in my life up to this point.

Generally I've found that in myself and others there's a variable chance that when we encounter new information that some part of shadow of a part would be retained.

I'm not sure whether I should envy you the lack of subconscious, unspoken effects from being around others...

And it's rather self-evident that if you're still actively refusing to even try to comprehend gender that you're not going to be open enough for any explanation we give you to be of use or actually be received, so what's the point for us to continue discussing it with you if that's how you've decided to go?

On the other hand, how removed from society were you really when you were in your larval form such that you would not have been getting the same education as any other child just from interacting with pre-existing humans and other developing humans?

No, not in the least. "If it is learned, you must necessarily have learned it" is nonsensical.

Considering the constant exposure of society and living amongst other humans, basic comprehension of gender would have, by hook or by crook, been absorbed even if one did not agree with it or buy into the idea, if gender were nothing more than rules that old humans actively and consciously teach to new humans.

Is that more clear?

Conversely, if it were an innate natural feature common to all people, Lissou would have also possessed it - thanks to biology, that claim isn't actually true, but it's no less untrue than the claim that "if it were learned, you would have learned it".

Barring, of course, developmental differences that cause things ranging from Klinefelter's to color blindness to bipolar disorder to having an extra toe here or there. This has already been postulated as one possible source of the inability to comprehend that others have a sense of their gender identity or the idea of having a gender identity.

Intersexed individuals do not disprove the existence of male and female as the two sexes that must contribute gametes in order to make new humans.

[Knaight]

You have that fine of a control over your memory? Or do you have to consciously choose to retain anything you're exposed to? Because the way you seem to be discussing processing information is unlike any that I've encountered in my life up to this point.

Generally I've found that in myself and others there's a variable chance that when we encounter new information that some part of shadow of a part would be retained.

I'm not sure whether I should envy you the lack of subconscious, unspoken effects from being around others...

And it's rather self-evident that if you're still actively refusing to even try to comprehend gender that you're not going to be open enough for any explanation we give you to be of use or actually be received, so what's the point for us to continue discussing it with you if that's how you've decided to go?

Comprehension and belief are two entirely different things. One can have a comprehension of something without believing it. For instance, I understand the flat earth theory just fine. I also think its utter and complete B.S. Much of what this post is is using evidence of comprehension to support the notion expressed prior that anything that can be learned, has been and as such will be believed.

[Serpentine]

Considering the constant exposure of society and living amongst other humans, basic comprehension of gender would have, by hook or by crook, been absorbed even if one did not agree with it or buy into the idea, if gender were nothing more than rules that old humans actively and consciously teach to new humans.

Is that more clear?

For starters, whoever said anything about the teaching being conscious?
For seconds, my parents actually actively and consciously avoided teaching my sister and I about "gender roles" and other related nonsense. My mother was the primary bread-winner, a doctor; my father was a teacher and for a while before I was born was a stay-at-home father. My sister wasn't given any dolls and similarly "girl-only" toys - as a result, she started choosing her friends based on how many dolls they had (oh look, evidence for one sex-linked tendency, which I haven't denied, or was it social pressures outside the family?), so they started giving her some. Learning from their mistakes, I was given a variety of toys of all and no genderedness. I grew up with Barbie dolls, dolls, My Little Ponies, stuffed toys, a toy train, tonka trucks, Lego, and so on. As I told my dad once, I never "got" playing with Barbies, not "properly".
So, in the home, my sister and I were taught nothing much in particular about gender. We liked what we liked, and didn't what we didn't. Both of us have grown up with a mix of supposedly "gendered" traits, neither of us believe that any of them "should" or "should not" be present in either sex, and (aside from not getting invited onto fishing trips and instead having to invite myself) our respective so-called "genders", or lack of them, have had little or no significant impact on our lives - although my sister was threatened to be fired once for not shaving her legs.
So. We were not taught "genders" by our family, and our "genders" have little or no impact on our senses of self. From other sources we learned that the different sexes were expected to like certain things or behave certain ways, but we never internalised it, and if anything were taught to question it.

Extra evidence: the very fact that sex-linked expectations vary from culture to culture. If it was entirely, or even mostly, biological, they would be far more consistent than they are.
Cf: Social ideals of beauty. There is a biological foundation - symmetrical features and a particular body fat level are good indicators for health and fertility. But it varies massively between cultures and through time, for often arbitrary reasons and not uncommonly outright harmful outcomes.

Intersexed individuals do not disprove the existence of male and female as the two sexes that must contribute gametes in order to make new humans.

Why on Earth are you saying that in response to me?

[Murdim]

Sure it does. Given the premise of individuals who are, despite lengthy explanations and a lifetime of education by interacting with gendered individuals, incapable of comprehending gender, the simplest explanation is that they have, as part of their being on some level or another, an inability to understand gender.

And so, if gender were something that was fundamentally nothing more than a learned behavior, these individuals who are capable of learning and otherwise of the normal range of mentality and intelligence would be capable of grasping it even if they did not subscribe to it.

Thusly, comprehending gender must be more complicated than mere active education and either be a result of a lot of passive influences (in which case, in the unthinking, apathetic way of humans, it seems quite unlikely that a pair of parents would be able to excise those passive cues from their child's development) or some part of the human mind that picks up on those sorts of influences & cues and interprets them for the conscious self.

Counterargument : the concepts of gender vary between people. The only actual constant in the definition of "gender" is that it is a set of expectations that are autonomous from, but ultimately tied to, biological sex. This I doubt agendered people find difficult to grasp. Nor do they somehow miss out all the "nudges" sent by society about the dominant conceptions of masculinity and feminity.

What they do not get (and that I do not get either, despite being technically cisgendered) is why people put so much emphasis and credibility in the notion of gender. Many comparable constructs are now rejected by society at large, such as racialism. It's not very socially acceptable anymore to say that, while people of different skin colors are all persons and should enjoy the same rights and opportunities, we should still treat them differently in daily life because race is still an important reality. By contrast, gender is this weird sacred cow, where it is gender-blindness that is almost considered offensive.

[Knaight]

What they do not get (and that I do not get either, despite being technically cisgendered) is why people put so much emphasis and credibility in the notion of gender. Many comparable constructs are now rejected by society at large, such as racialism. It's not very socially acceptable anymore to say that, while people of different skin colors are all persons and should enjoy the same rights and opportunities, we should still treat them differently in daily life because race is still an important reality. By contrast, gender is this weird sacred cow, where it is gender-blindness that is almost considered offensive.

With the possible exception of a handful of very learned experts nobody has really all that great an understanding of why people put so much emphasis and credibility in the notion of gender. It is an incredibly old notion, and anything that would even approach a complete understanding would have to look at the gradual development of multiple understandings of gender throughout a variety of cultures from hunter gatherer societies up until modern day. Moreover, one would need to study the general thought processes encouraged by these societies for context, and have a strong understanding of modern psychology, just as a starting point. Sure, we can theorize, but getting any real depth in these theories requires a huge amount of prior knowledge.

I'd actually expect a better understanding of this from people who are agendered or transgendered relative to those who are cisgendered, on a population scale. A system which seems to fit you just fine doesn't inherently provoke an inclination towards studying it and can be mostly invisible, a system that marginalizes you is highly visible and provokes examination.

[Coidzor]

edit: Come to think of it. What are we actually saying to one another at this point?

It might be the drambuie talking, but it seems like there's some critical connection that we're not making here. or possibly the lack of sleep...

How to put this...?

So, from my best recollection, it goes something like this.

Lissou made a statement that, as I interpreted it, was a claim that gender was a learned behavior that adults teach to children in a way that suggested an active role in the teaching rather than being the result of passive influences.

There was a secondary query, the exact nature of which I cannot recall at this moment, but I believe about understanding something or another, to which the majority of my initial response which attempted and failed to be witty by pointing out that if things really were so simple as the premise she laid out, then Lissou should not have been able to go through life with that much education flung at her without getting some understanding of gender. As I had recalled that it had previously been intimated that they felt no feeling of gender nor did they understand the feeling in others or the concept itself.

So, when Lissou responded to it, she did not seem to indicate that my interpretation of her words was incorrect, and so I proceeded to defend my assertion that gender has more to it than merely being something that old people teach us when we're children. Or at least, trying to do so, but in retrospect I cannot really tell if that was the component of what I said that was being reacted against.

[Murdim]

Coidzor edited his post, but I still think that's a precision I have to make. I am certainly NOT equating the very sensation of feeling like a man or a woman with being prejudiced against ethnic group A.

I'm equating the sensation of feeling like a man or a woman with the sensation of feeling like a member of a specific race. Just because you identify as something does not mean you are prejudiced against people you identify as something else (racism/sexism), or even that you grant any kind of importance to the concept behind your identification label (racialism/thinking-that-gender-is-important-ism).

[Coidzor]

No, no I'm not. Not by any stretch of the imagination. I'm equating the sensation of feeling like a man or a woman with the sensation of feeling like a member of a specific race. Just because you identify as something does not mean you are prejudiced against people you identify as something else (racism/sexism), or even that you grant any kind of importance to the concept behind your identification label (racialism/thinking-that-gender-is-important-ism).

So what's wrong with feeling like a member of a particular race then?

[Murdim]

So what's wrong with feeling like a member of a particular race then?

As far as I'm concerned? Nothing. I am a white male and I identify as such, it's just that I'm completely apathetic about it.

On the other hand, the fact that I am perceived as a white male is very important and something I can't just ignore, because it has an influence on the way society treats me. But that's another matter entirely.

[bluewind95]

I don't think labels are in and of themselves a bad thing. They're vital to the way we are wired to learn. I do think, however, that people ought to be taught how to use them. Labels are something to give a quick pre-understanding of something. However, they should not be something to shoehorn things into. Things can and should be re-labeled appropriately, not forced into a label that does not really describe them. So if I look at someone that seems biologically female, I may say "woman, female" as a pre-understanding. But I could be wrong and it could be a transgendered person. So upon learning this, I should be flexible enough to re-label this person in order to use labels the way they should be used- that is, to understand a concept. And should that person be one that likes to present as either gender, then I should not try to shoehorn them into one, but should re-label them "can be either, both, or none at once" or something like that.

[rayne_dragon]

One last thing: We don't use gender against other people when we use it.

While WarKitty and Lissou have said plenty in reply to this already, I wanted to add my own point. People use gender against other people all the time. If I go out pretending to be a boy, people use that against me in a myriad of ways; if I go out pretending to be a girl, people use that against me in a whole host of different ways. And fortune forbid if someone heteronormative ever finds out that you don't fit the gender binary - gender is used against you like a chainsaw in a slasher flick, sometimes even by people who are trying to be open-minded and sympathetic.

[Asta Kask]

I don't see changing that people react with surprise and amazement when they see something rare (such as a genderqueer person - although some definitions makes me think everyone is genderqueer).

[Lissou]

Coidzor: I understand personality traits but not why they're classified into gender, and why gender became something to be enforced. Furthermore, I don't see why because something is taught everyone should know it. General education here in France is the same for everyone but you'll still have some people who don't get math and some who can't speak English. They were both taught the same thing, they just didn't learn the same things.

If we are going to talk about race, then I should explain how the comparison would work for me. For me, a comparison would be if there was a word for race that's the physical thing as we know it, and then a different word for a mental thing.
Then, on top of having people identify as one or another inner race, pretty much everything would be considered one or the other. If you're white and you like sewing, it's weird, because it's a black thing. If you're black and are good with crosswords, it's weird, because it's a white thing. Stuff like that.
And then you'd have people who suffer so much from the conflict between their race and inner race that they need to colour their skin and say they're actually the other colour but were born the wrong way.

There are stereotypes for race, but they generally don't involve as many things as the gender ones do, and there is no word for inner race like the sex/gender thing. So imagine if now, suddenly, that's how most of everyone else worked, and you'd have to figure out which is which and constantly deal with everything you do either being "normal, because you're white" or "weird, considering you're white".

Obviously, here I picked black and white when there are many more ethnicities, that's for the sake of the comparison I'm trying to make.

By the way, you can use feminine pronouns with me. In the absence of a gender, it's my sex that matters as far as pronouns are concerned, I feel. I mean personally, other people can make that decision for themselves the way they want.

[rayne_dragon]

I don't see changing that people react with surprise and amazement when they see something rare (such as a genderqueer person - although some definitions makes me think everyone is genderqueer).

That's not what I'm talking about, although I disagree about the surprise amazement being unchangeable. One saying they were bisexual used to be met with surprise and amazement all the time. Now it's common enough that it's not the asumed reaction. There's no reason the same thing can't happen with genderqueer and the like.

Aside from that surprise isn't always that bad ("Oh, so you're genderqueer?! Neat!")... how some people act once the surprise wears off is worse.

[Asta Kask]

That's not what I'm talking about, although I disagree about the surprise amazement being unchangeable. One saying they were bisexual used to be met with surprise and amazement all the time. Now it's common enough that it's not the asumed reaction. There's no reason the same thing can't happen with genderqueer and the like.

I said 'when they see something rare'. You said 'now it's common enough...' See the disconnect?

[rayne_dragon]

I said 'when they see something rare'. You said 'now it's common enough...' See the disconnect?

Well, arguably, genderqueer is something that's new and becomming more common, so it's not entirely irrelevant. Also, I probably should have used the term 'well-known' rather than 'common', the rarity of knowledge of a subject doesn't determine the rarity of the subject itself. Something that you know of is less surprising than something that you previously had no knowledge of.

[golentan]

So, on another note (since this debate has started to bore me), what are you guys' experiences with gaymers, gay geeks, and the like? Some people I know have commented they seem to be far and in between, but I know a fair number of LGBT folks with interests in dicey matters.

[Yora]

Hard to say, among the people I associate with we don't make a big deal about our sexual lives. Some are married to each other, others sometime mention they have a plan with their girlfriends at some day, and that pretty much is it.
Some years ago I knew one guy who I know was gay, and a couple who were both bisexual, but that pretty much was it. We never really talked about that.

[Coidzor]

So, on another note (since this debate has started to bore me), what are you guys' experiences with gaymers, gay geeks, and the like? Some people I know have commented they seem to be far and in between, but I know a fair number of LGBT folks with interests in dicey matters.

Frank Lee, I flind the bear-faced puns they bring to bear to be unbearable.

[rayne_dragon]

So, on another note (since this debate has started to bore me), what are you guys' experiences with gaymers, gay geeks, and the like? Some people I know have commented they seem to be far and in between, but I know a fair number of LGBT folks with interests in dicey matters.

There's been a fair number of people I know who are both bi/pan and gamers. Only a few gamers I've ever met have been strictly gay (or even rarer lesbian*).

* - most of the lesbian-esque gamers I know are more demi-lesbians since while they might have a strong preference for women they also infrequently are attracted to men. They still outnumber the gay male gamers that I know.

[Tyndmyr]

So, on another note (since this debate has started to bore me), what are you guys' experiences with gaymers, gay geeks, and the like? Some people I know have commented they seem to be far and in between, but I know a fair number of LGBT folks with interests in dicey matters.

I'd guess it doesn't differ much from the general population...but of course, local groups certainly might have less or more. I've certainly known and known of a decent variety of LGBT geeks, and if anything, they seemed more open about sexuality in general than non gamer sorts, but that might be just the people I know. *shrug*

The only real statistical abberation I can think of is an apparently larger amount of...can't think of a label for this. Women who like watching gay dudes. Seems substantially more common among gamers. Probably the kind of thing that's remarkably hard to survey for, though, so it'd be quite difficult to get any actual stats or evidence beyond an anecdotal level. So much of social science is like that, I'm afraid. Messy feelings and social stigmas getting in the way of my precious data.